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Larks on a String
Directed by Jiri Menzel, 1969
Below you will find links and a number of questions and information about Larks on a String. Please consider these as an outline for Wednesday's discussion.
LINKS:
http://www.filmkultura.iif.hu:8080/articles/profiles/menz2.en.html
Link regarding Bohumil Hrabal’s writing: http://www.guardianunlimited.co.uk/Print/0,3858,4140151,00.html
For a site on Czech and Slovak cinema that includes interviews, reviews, and essays: http://maxpages.com/czechcinema/
FOR DISCUSSION:
1.) In his article, "Jiri Menzel and the Second Prague Spring",
George Bluestone considers Menzel’s films to be "more interested in Chekhovian
epiphanies than in broad political gestures" (Bluestone, 26). Do you consider
this to be an accurate statement regarding "Larks on a String"? And what
is the significance of the seemingly insignificant?
(Bluestone, George. "Jiri Menzel and the Second Prague Spring." Film Quarterly
v. 44 (Fall ‘90) p. 23-31.)
2.) Following the completion of Larks on a String in 1969, Menzel was not allowed to work in film for five years, Bohumil Hrabal–whose stories the film adapted–could not publish again until 1976, while the film itself was banned for over two decades. How does the film succeed as a powerful indictment of Communist bureaucracy more than twenty years later?
3.) The "Czechoslovak New Wave" is known for doing away with traditional scripts and studio sets (Liehm). Comment on the idea of a work camp and, even more specifically, the scrap metal yard. How are relationships between men and women portrayed in the film and what is their purpose?
4.) How are Communist officials and the prison guard portrayed?
5.) How does the director effectively utilize imagery to convey meaning (i.e. fire, water, angels, to name only a few)?
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Photo courtesy of http://www.artfilm.sk/jury96/menzel.html |
Jiri Menzel was born in Prague, Czechoslovakia in 1938. Receiving his diploma from the famed Prague Film School, FAMU, in 1962 from the faculty of Film and Television, Mr. Menzel is known as one of the inspiring directors of the "New Wave" which dominated the Czechoslovak Film Miracle in the 1960's–considered to be responsible for an entirely new film language at a time characterized by an upsurge in Czechoslovak films that sought the truth about man and society. His distinguished career includes acting, writing and directing in film, television and theater. Among his many accolades, his first full-length feature, Closely Watched Trains (1966) won the Academy Award for best foreign language film. |
